Ghost-Town Heart - Part II

Posted on Sun Feb 28th, 2016 @ 8:57pm by Captain Li Hawke & Maxym Balasz & Lieutenant Commander Michael Darwin

Mission: Further Challenges
Location: XO's Quarters

“Li, listen to me!” Max fell silent then and reached out mentally, entering her thoughts. It’s me...Max. Read me and you’ll know it’s true. He opened the neck of his shirt slightly, revealing the necklace. “See?”

Li grew still as she focused on him, sensing his thoughts and finally lowered the phaser. “Max? You’re here? Not Rhys?” She was obviously bewildered. “He came back, you know. Some sort of psychic energy, and tried to make Sakkath kill me. Since then, I’ve never been sure if he’s really gone for good.” Seeing the necklace, she was suddenly satisfied it truly was Max. The phaser slipped from her fingers and she threw herself into his arms.

Oh Li, my darling, I am so sorry for all of that….and for the loss of Sakkath too. He held her tight and the scent of her familiar perfume washed over him, bringing with it so many cherished memories. “What can I do?”

“I’m fine.” She pulled away as she gave him her standard answer. His mention of Sakkath wasn’t what she wanted to talk about. “My apologies for the phaser too. Come, sit down.”

When they had settled on the sofa, she turned to face him. “It was some time ago that Rhys...well here.” She passed to him the memories of the time Rhys had inhabited Sakkath and all the trouble it had caused. “You see why I am still cautious?”

Max rubbed his eyes and nodded. “I wish I had been here. I wish I’d said something that day….” He touched the necklace once more, knowing she would get the reference. “I was so close. When you said you weren’t ready to marry him, I decided to beg you not to go through with it at all. I intended to tell you…” He stopped and shook his head. “Then he showed up and the opportunity was gone. If I had, none of that would’ve happened.’

“You’re wrong, Max. It might have been worse. I sensed the awful jealousy in him that day but I just...put it aside as his usual possessiveness.”

Max nodded. “And now I finally catch up to you in time to offer comfort for the loss of your husband. If there’s anything you need….”

“No.” Li cut him off and once more was up, moving around the room. “Can we talk about anything but that? I don’t want to think about it. What I want is not to be afraid of my own quarters, and to go back to work but no one will let me.”

Her phrasing worried Max and he could understand Lucius’ concern. He watched her wander, then rose and went to the bar. He poured two glasses of Aldebaran whiskey and carrying them over, he stepped in front of her, forcing her to stop and face him. He slipped a glass into her hand. “I have some ideas about that.”

“Oh?” Li took a drink, then looked up at Max. “Maybe you could talk to Dad? Convince him that I need to go back on duty before I lose my mind?”

He drained his glass and set it aside before taking her free hand in his. “Li, honey, I agree with Lucius. I don’t think it’s a good idea yet. You seem a little….well….scattered still. You’ve suffered a terrible blow and you need a little time to deal with it.”

“I’m fine,” she said again.

Max shook his head slowly. “No, you’re not. I am in your head, I can see everything. I see what you’re refusing to face.” There. He’d said it. He suspected that the others had been trying to step delicately, not wanting to be blunt and upset her but that wasn’t going to fix things. He was here to break the spell, as he’d put it to Lucius, and that started with cracking the shell she had built around herself.

Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Max. “Refusing to face? You want to know what I am refusing to face? Then see….” She opened up to him and poured into his thoughts all the hurt, sadness, and rage that she had locked away. She hadn’t wanted to accidentally flood Darwin’s head with it for fear it might damage him but she knew Max could take it.

The chaos of emotions hit him so fast and hard, he felt his knees buckle and it kept coming, wave after wave. It was only the bar that kept him from falling to the carpet.

“Li…” he whispered.

“You want to know?” she yelled at him. “Now you do! After all I went through with Rhys, I finally found happiness and then? It was taken from me!” She hurled her glass at the wall and began to pace before him. The storm of her emotions threatened to submerge him, but there was no stopping it. “He became a part of me absolutely, and then….gone! How am I supposed to face that? Accept it as everyone thinks I should? There’s a hole in my mind where he used to be but now isn’t! How do I get beyond that? I don’t want to deal with it. The pain is unspeakable!” She started towards the door and Max got moving. Darting around her, he pressed his back to the doors.

She closed in on him, her fists now hammering against his chest. “He loved me and now he’s left me. How could he do that?? He left me just like you did!!” She collapsed in his arms and began to sob, the echo of her last words still ringing in Max’s head.

So you knew….. He wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or worried about that.

Li nodded against his chest. “I suspected, yes, then I read it in Rhys’ thoughts. By that time we were on the Berkeley,” she stammered. “That day at the Falls….he thought you intended to talk me out of marrying him. It’s why he was so riled up when he found us.” She looked up at him now. “You were going to…..” she suddenly realized.

“Yes, but then the moment got away and he made sure I didn’t have another chance.” Ever.

She was silent for a few minutes as he held her, her breathing slowly settling down. Finally, she spoke.

“He’s really gone, isn’t he?”

“Yes.” He knew she meant Sakkath. “For your sake, I wish I had a different answer,” he whispered. “But refusing to think about it, avoiding it because you feel guilty over being angry won’t solve the problem Li. It’s just tearing you apart.” He hesitated before he brought up another big concern. He had seen everything about Darwin in her thoughts and it had to be addressed. “It’s not good for Darwin either. He’s human, Li. He cannot withstand the emotional impact.” At the moment, Max was having a hard time handling it himself, so overwhelmed was he. “It’s admirable that he cares so much, but if you continue to lean on him, it could cause him some serious emotional issues.”

Li’s grip on Max tightened. “It’s causing you pain now,” she murmured. “I’m sorry.”

“I’ll be alright. Come.” He led her back to the sofa and sat down, settling her against him. “I think you may be off balance, at least until Sokar sees you. I can handle it for now, don’t worry.”

She nodded once more, then let out a sigh. “If I am having to face reality, then you will too.”

“What--?” Before he could finish the question, he felt her in his mind once more, pushing through the wall behind which he kept hidden his deepest secrets. “Li…..no….” It was too late. What he’d kept hidden from her all these years was suddenly free, filling his thoughts and his heart, blowing him wide open. He closed his eyes as the tears began to flow. He was sure Lucius had foreseen this, but there was no going back now.

“It was always you I wanted back then,” she whispered. “Rhys knew and I think it’s why he changed so much, why in the end, he lost control. I’m so sorry. I should’ve said…”

“No. Don’t ever apologize for that. We were all caught up in a situation that got out of hand. There was nothing you could have done then, and there’s nothing you could’ve done now to prevent the loss of Sakkath. You know that he would understand all these feelings but he wouldn’t want you breaking apart. That’s not you.”

“He was supposed to always be here.” Li’s voice broke. “He was supposed to be the constant in my crazy life. And now, everything has changed.”

Max tightened his arm around her and brushed a kiss to the top of her head, a habit he’d developed with Li when they were growing up.

“Life does that, Li. It is change. Think of it in terms of music. A singer can hold a single note for a very long time, but eventually it’s just noise. It’s the change we’re listening for - the next note and the one after that that makes it music. The variation, the new notes still to come. You can’t hold on to the single note that is the past or eventually it will lose its meaning altogether.”

She considered that and finally nodded. It was true. All the wonderful times with Sakkath had come from the changes, the variety, the differences, one note blending into the next. Whatever happened now, the song they had made would always be with her.

“You’re crying,” she murmured. Taking hold of the hem of her dress, she reached up to dry the tears from his cheeks. “I am so sorry. This is going to leave you as messed up as me.”

“It’s alright.” He’d almost said ‘fine’ but was making an effort to stay away from that word. “We’ll get you through it.”

“I think that maybe now I can. Avoiding thinking about it at all kept me from remembering the good things. It kept him completely away and that’s worse.”

“It is. I am a master at locking away feelings that are too big to be faced and I regret it deeply. Don’t live like that.” Like I have. He felt the brush of her thoughts mingling with his and closed his eyes. For so long he’d wanted that, dreamed of it….and now the circumstances were all mixed up. He wasn’t sure how he’d handle it going forward.

“One note at a time,” she answered, picking up the question. “We’ll figure it out.”

They fell silent, snuggled together on the sofa. He gently stroked her back, their thoughts intertwined, seeing the past, shared secrets, hopes for the future. Finally, he felt her body relax into sleep. He slipped out of her arms and settled her gently on the sofa, then covered her with the silk blanket that was tossed over the chair. He sat on the floor beside her, enjoying the quiet, holding her hand. Finally he raised it to his lips. Just then, the door chime rang and he rose hurrying over to answer it, wiping his eyes again as the doors parted.

Expecting Li to have answered the door, Darwin was taken aback by the man who answered. He’d been delayed getting here - he’d run into Edana near Piper and had to talk his way around her. It hadn’t been easy as some of Li’s emotions had hit him and he’d stammered his way through a lame excuse before running for a turbolift. Now, he stared at the man and his brain assigned him a name that was impossible: Rhys Balasz. But he was dead. Darwin reacted with his fists anyway, grabbing the man by the shirt and demanding, “What the hell have you done to Li?”

In order to save his face from a pounding, Max answered the question the fast way - mentally. It took only a split second to explain who he was and why he was there.

“Let go and come in but be quiet. She’s sleeping.”

Darwin, riled up and ready to hit something, took a moment to calm down and release Max’s shirt. He smoothed the man’s shirt front then looked over at Li on the couch.

Max led him through to the kitchen and began to make some coffee. He suspected he was going to need it if he intended to sit watch tonight. Finally, it was brewing and he turned to Darwin.

“Sorry to invade your head like that but it seemed that speed was needed before my face met your fist.”

“Um... yeah,” Darwin didn’t apologize. “Li’s been in here lately, too. Seems to be a popular place for Betazoids.” His adrenaline had spiked, not just because of Max’s presence, but because Li’s emotions had hit him hard and then eased and disappeared from his head. “But she’s gone at the moment. What did you do to her?”

“Lucius thought that my appearing at her door might be just the thing to jar her out of her self-imposed haze,” Max answered. He rubbed his raw eyes a moment. “It did but the onslaught was brutal.”

“I felt her fear, then ...,” he shook his head. He’d been assaulted with grief, rage and fear on his way here, enough that he’d been hard-pressed to talk to Edana. “Nice going,” he backhandedly complimented Max.

“Wait….you felt her emotions?” Concern settled on Max’s face now. “That’s not good. Where were you when it happened?”

“Coming back from Piper. I suppose we’ve been a bit... involved... lately.” He shrugged. “You can head out, Mr. Balasz, I’ll stay and watch over her.”

“My apologies, Commander, but that’s not a good idea,” Max replied. “I understand your involvement with Li and it’s a problem. For you mainly. If you’re feeling her emotions as far away as the main sickbay, it’s only going to get worse and that’ll cause you some serious emotional issues. Think about the incident just now, then consider what would happen if what hit you were much bigger, incapacitating even. That is to be avoided if at all possible.” He studied Darwin a moment and frowned. “It’s already leading to a strong attachment to her on your part, whether you want it or not.”

Darwin’s jaw tensed. “That strong attachment is our friendship. I suppose you feel more equipped to handle her emotions?”

“Take a closer look, Darwin.” Max’s tone was softer. “There’s more here than friendship.” He sighed and rubbed his temple. “I’d like to say yes, I am more equipped to deal with it but it was almost too much for me. When she opened up to me, if it hadn’t been for the bar, I would’ve been in the floor. It was searing and I was sure I’d be shattered for a bit there. I can’t recall the last time I bawled like a baby….until now.”

Irrationally, Darwin wanted to argue who was better suited to stay with Li. His commbadge saved Max from the argument. Gilroy’s voice came over it, =^=Darwin, come see me in Oz’s office, please.=^= He looked at Max and said, “I’ll stop by later.” It was more of a warning than anything else.

Max nodded. “We’ll be here. The good news is I think things have taken a turn for the better.” He walked Darwin to the door. “Thank you, too. For being there when she needed you.”

Darwin nodded, glanced at Li on the couch, then left her to Max’s care.

Max stood, watching Li for several seconds, then returned to the kitchen. He poured a cup of coffee and leaned back against the counter as he sipped it. He had been right. It was going to be a long night.

*******************
Ambassador Max Balasz
No More Secrets

Captain Li Hawke
No More Denial

Lt. Cmdr. M. Darwin
Just a Little Over-Protective